Page 45 of Meet Me In The Dark (Skeptically In Love #3)

Celeste

Somehow, we made it back to the house.

Somehow, we showered off the salt and sand, scrubbed away the evidence of the ocean, and yet he hasn’t touched me since.

Not like that.

Not the way I need him to.

It’s driving me insane.

Julian is too quiet, his eyes too dark and unreadable, as I step into yet another new pair of sleep shorts.

I’m about to put on the matching vest top, thinking that maybe he really just wants to sleep, that maybe his worries about hurting me have taken over, when his hand wraps around my wrist.

“Off. Now.”

The words barely leave his lips before I obey, and the fabric whispers to the floor, leaving me bare and breathless beneath his gaze.

His eyes travel down my body.

It makes me ache.

It makes me want to push him to the breaking point.

I move closer, pressing my bare chest against his. “I want you.”

His jaw tightens. “Not yet.”

The frustration bubbles up, but a sharp gasp replaces it when his fingers glide between my thighs, slipping through the wetness pooling there.

I exhale shakily and hold onto his arms to steady myself.

He moves so slowly it’s almost unbearable, but I know why he’s doing it.

He’s afraid.

Afraid of hurting me again.

And maybe there’s a small part of me that’s afraid, too.

His other hand cups my breast before his thumb rolls over my nipple, and that fear fizzles into nothing.

The backs of my knees hit the bed, and then I’m falling, sinking into the plush mattress.

He follows me down, his mouth brushing over my throat, over the rapid pulse hammering there.

I arch into him as my thighs part in invitation.

His fingers glide through my slickness, teasing and testing.

“Fuck,” he curses, his voice thick with restraint.

He strokes me once, twice, watching me writhe, his jaw set like steel.

“Julian,” I cry out, my fingers gripping the sheets.

My body fractures under his hand, pleasure flooding me in waves until I’m shaking and melted into the mattress.

When he’s done, he presses the most devastating kiss to my mouth, but he doesn’t pin me down.

He doesn’t take control the way he always does.

Instead, he lies back and sprawls out against the pillows.

“Come here.”

I move toward him, and he grabs my hand, intertwining our fingers as he guides me over him.

“Your pace.”

I swear, my chest cracks wide open.

Julian never gives up control. Not with me. Not with anyone.

But tonight, he’s handing it back to me.

I lean forward to kiss him, and with aching slowness, I sink down onto him.

The stretch takes my breath away.

We both pause and wait for the pain, but it never comes. It’s just this deep, perfect ache of him filling me.

“I’m good,” I say, meaning it.

He searches my face, then nods. His grip eases, and I start to move.

It’s slow at first, lazy rolls of my hips that take him deeper every time. His eyes stay on me, tracking every breath, every sound.

This feels like more than sex.

It feels like trust.

I brace myself on his chest, watching the way his lips part, the way his throat bobs, the way his brows pull together like I’m ruining him. And I think I am, because he’s ruining me too.

My body shakes as the pleasure builds.

It’s too slow, too deep, too much, and not enough all at once.

Sensing what I’m chasing, he pushes up into me, meeting me halfway.

A broken cry rips from my lips as his hips rise again and again, driving me to the edge of oblivion.

He reaches up to cradle both sides of my face before pulling me into another kiss. He swallows every sound that escapes my lips, every cry and every moan.

“Open your eyes,” he demands.

I do.

I look at him, and my entire world tilts because it’s in his eyes that I feel it building, something terrifying, something I can’t run from.

A sharp breath catches in my throat.

His own breath shudders.

We both feel it.

This thing.

This scary, inevitable thing.

“Keep looking at me,” he orders, his voice gravelly, rough.

I nod and take all of him even when my thighs start burning and my lungs are gasping for air.

“I want to see those eyes when you fall apart.”

My body bows, and I finally find that blinding release on the cry of his name.

He’s right there with me, following me over the edge as his mouth parts on a guttural moan.

When it’s over, when we’re spent and tangled and breathless, I collapse against his chest.

I don’t know how long we stay that way, with his arms around my body.

I just know I never want to leave.